


Horns

by sipuli



Series: hhhhh i'm dream smp trash [1]
Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Nightmares, Oneshot, petition to give tubbo a hug, poor tubbo needs a break, this is before tubbo finds out tommy is alive btw, tubbo with horns is a nice aesthetic, what if it was a metaphor of his fear of becoming evil like schlatt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-15 15:00:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28690563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sipuli/pseuds/sipuli
Summary: Nightmares and guilt won't leave Tubbo alone. What if he really is like Schlatt?
Series: hhhhh i'm dream smp trash [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2122566
Kudos: 20





	Horns

**Author's Note:**

> I originally made this account just for my big translation project but I figured I could also put some of my own writing here. Here's a very short, very angsty oneshot about Tubbo dealing with guilt of thinking he's the reason his best friend died. In other words: I don't write happiness. Like at all. All I know is pain.
> 
> My Twitter is @sipuli_ just in case someone wants to see more of my writing (or my rambling and theories and chaotic livetweeting).

_You’re acting like Schlatt._

The words circle around Tubbo’s head, taunting him in mocking whispers, using the words and voices of his friends. In the last few weeks they have slowly and steadily been growing stronger and louder, occupying every second of silence, every moment without other thoughts to bury them with. And even other thoughts don’t seem to be enough anymore. Tubbo tries to keep his mind busy, to not give the voices any room to worm their way into the smallest cracks of his defenses, but it’s getting harder by the day. The voices are getting more and more pressing, they hammer their way into his mind to keep him up at night, to drive him to toss and turn in his bed for hours until finally getting up and staggering his way to the bathroom just so he could see his face in the mirror. Just so he could make sure there’s no horns growing out of his scalp. 

_You’re acting like Schlatt._

“I’m not,” Tubbo whispers to his reflection, but he doesn’t sound very confident in his own words. The Tubbo in the mirror stares back at him. Does his face really look like that? Are his eyes truly that hopeless and desperate, that full of fear? He moves his eyes up and his arm follows the movement, the reflection following in perfect sync, bringing his hand on his forehead and then slowly, carefully running it through his hair, looking for two sharp bumps pushing through his skin. He can feel it, in his dreams and on the worst days even when he’s awake, something _evil_ making its way out through his skull. He has to check, even though his fingers never meet anything but soft, brown hair.

He doesn’t find anything. He never does. But it doesn’t make him feel any better.

It’s becoming an obsession. He knows it’s not logical, he knows it’s ridiculous and doesn’t make any biological sense, but he can’t shake the fear of one day looking into the mirror and seeing himself turning into someone or something he’s not, something he’s _not_ , something he _can’t be_ -

_You’re acting like Schlatt._

“I’M NOT HIM!”

The scream bounces off the white glazed tiles that cover the walls and it sounds so full of emotion but so empty at the same time, trapped in this small room without a way out, without a place to go. Tubbo is alone, it’s the middle of the night and there’s no one else in the big, empty White House and no one hears him screaming in a desperate attempt to convince himself, except his own mind, and it has an answer ready. Like it always does. _Are you sure?_ it whispers, in a voice of someone and everyone and everything he doesn’t want to think about. _How about we ask Tommy?_

And that’s the one argument, the one accusation, the one attack he can’t dodge or avoid. How can he not be like Schlatt, when he drove his best friend away? How can he not be like Schlatt, when he’s the one who left Tommy isolated and alone, convinced that no one cares about him anymore, hopeless enough to… to…

Tubbo shuts that thought down before it has time to grow into something too big, too horrible for his mind to handle. He doesn’t want to give his nightmares any more material to work with. They already have plenty.

He’s had so many nightmares of the Festival, they came quickly and were there to stay. Nightmares where he’s locked in the box, Schlatt and Quackity looking down at him, and Techno with his crossbow, _I’m sorry, I’ll make it as painless as possible_ , and he never actually shoots him because the dream always ends before it happens but in a way that’s almost worse, because maybe if Techno actually did what he did in real life the nightmare would end and not come back the next night.

But if Tubbo had a choice, he would take those dreams back in a heartbeat. As much as he hated them, as much as he wished they would stop tormenting him every night, he would happily choose them over the dream he now has every night. Because now when he closes his eyes and drifts to restless sleep and travels back to the day he died for the first time, he’s not the one in the box anymore, he’s not the one cowering inside the walls, staring at the crossbow pointed at his head, unable to take his eyes off it. In the nightmares he now has, the ones that have been haunting him ever since the day they all stood on the wall, he is not in the box - he’s standing outside it, he’s the one giving the command, and Dream is standing in front of the box with that terrifying, unmoving smile on his mask and he’s pointing his crossbow at the one trapped inside it, who is -

 _You got what you wanted_ , the voices whisper, and Tubbo presses his hands on his ears and screams at them to stop but they won’t, _you wanted to get rid of him. You said so yourself. You told him his presence is not best for this nation. Well, now he’s gone, he’s gone for good, because of your decision, and how is this any different than just killing him yourself? He’s not going to bother you or your precious nation ever again. Well done, Mr. President. You got exactly what you wanted._

Tubbo isn’t trying to quiet down his mind anymore, he just sits on the bathroom floor in the dark and rests his hornless head on his palms, letting tears run down his face and drip-drip-drip to the floor. This isn’t what he wanted. He just wanted to do what’s right for L’Manberg. That’s all he ever wanted. It wasn’t supposed to go like this, no one was supposed to _die_ , he was just trying to _save_ everyone.

This isn’t what he wanted.


End file.
